Entries from June 2008 ↓
June 30th, 2008 — Blogging, Getting results
What do you, me, John Lennon, and Gerald M. Weinberg have in common? Short answer – we all writers.
Longer answer – we collect materials for our writing in very similar way. John was stuffing his pockets with papers, Gerald collects fieldstones, and I dig[g] for gold nuggets. What about you?
by Ryan McD
Most of the bloggers are after writing a book. I am sure you too. I am no exception. Then how do you build up your book?
John Lennon’s way of writing a book
I put things down on sheets of paper and stuff them in my pockets. When I have enough, I have a book. — John Lennon
Gerald M. Weinberg’s Fieldstone method
Gerald M.Weinberg has written a great practical book - Weinberg on Writing: The Fieldstone Method
. He compares collecting materials for your writing with collecting fieldstones for building a fieldstone wall. The book packed with practical exercises and with healthy dose of humor which makes it very enjoyable for reading that gains results too. It is hard to argue with Gerald’s success– he wrote ton of books…
My gold nuggets collection method
I am no different from John and Gerald (ha-ha-ha-ha!!!). Well, may be a bit – I use different tool for collecting gold nuggets for my writing, I use Outlook 2007. There are primarily three sources of gold nuggets:
The result is well ordered pipelines of items that can be quickly processed for any purpose, including writing books.
I took my Outlook 2007 even further and developed Outlook 2007 add-in that grabs all the items and generates a document of it - Generate Documents Out Of Mail Items Directly From Outlook 2007.
Too freaky? Guess so… checkout the book I generated from several latest blog posts of mine - download PDF file and see yourself. Does not it look like a book? Few clicks-to-done. [I am aware of few freaky characters in it – call it a bug that I need to fix].
Self Test
- Are you collecting your stones?
- Are your stones easily can be fit into a book?
- Why didn’t you write a book yet?
- Want clear answers and prescriptive guidance on writing a book?
Read Weinberg on Writing: The Fieldstone Method and implement the techniques that suits you best – papers in your pocket, Outlook 2007, or other habit.
June 28th, 2008 — Leadership, Motivation
Why becoming a leader? What does it take to become a leader? What’s leadership anyway? Is it attainable by anybody? Is there actionable guidance to become a leader?
I found the answers to almost all the questions in Gerald M. Weinberg book - Becoming a Technical Leader: An Organic Problem-Solving Approach.
My favorite is how he defines leadership.
by JessicaFairchild.com
Leadership is the process of creating an environment in which people become empowered. – Gerald M. Weinberg.
I found out that this definition can be easily applied not only to technical leadership but to any kind of leadership.
Family
Are you creating an environment in which your kids and your partner become empowered?
- Is your home a place where your family members long to be? Or each one seeks a reason to sneak outside if it?
- Are your kids passionately share their experiences they had in kindergarten or in the school? Or when you ask “How was your day?” you hear just “Fine”?
- Is you partner shares her deepest feelings, thoughts on life and work. Do you discuss a deeper meaning and then make love? Or you have transactional conversations and actions that sometimes concluded by just sex?
Work
Are you creating an environment in which your colleagues, managers, reports become empowered?
- Do you like coming to your work? Why?
- Do you like your office? Why?
- Do you like your colleagues? Why?
- Do your colleagues like you? Why?
- Are you writing emotionally intelligent emails that build rapport?
- Did you receive “Thank you!” email privately lately?
- Did you send “Thank you!” email privately lately?
- Are you genuinely interested in listening to what you colleague has to say?
- What’s your “street creds”?
- What nickname your co-workers gave you?
- What significant change you drove lately? How many followed?
- Are you “go-to” person for any subject of your interest/expertise?
Blogging
Are you creating an environment in which your blogofriends (real and virtual) become empowered?
Self
Are you creating an environment in which you become empowered?
Footnote
Becoming a leader looks actionable and attainable to me. I think you can easily become a leader. It is all about developing skills of creating environment that empowers people.
Mr. Universe doesn’t have more muscles than I do, just better developed ones. – Gerald M. Weinberg.
June 25th, 2008 — Communication Skills, Getting results, Influence Without Authority
Did you send a flame email lately? Regret? Sure you do. I did it few times and I wish it never happened. But why you were sending this flame email anyway? Tried to influence the other guy? The result – you just make one more enemy instead making friends.
Emotional Intelligence and Influence Without Authority are a broad topics that are out of scope for this post. Nevertheless, here is a simple technique to craft emails that help avoiding Emotional Intelligence pitfalls. It also helps building rapport which is the basis of Influence Without Authority.
by Evan•L
I use MS Outlook 2007 to craft my emails. I’ve created email template that guides me how to write the rapport emails (vs flame emails). I’ve also set a rule to delay each email for a minute – it gives me a chance to change my mind and delete it while it is still in Outbox just before it hits the wire.
Creating email template
While there is an option to build templated emails, using it involves multiple clicks which is productivity killer. I do not use templates and email forms. I’ve created signature that looks as follows:
[DO YOU REALLY NEED TO SEND THIS MESSAGE?]
[RAPPORT - MAKE THE OTHER PARTY LOVE YOU]
[UPFRONT ASK]
[EXPLAIN THE NEED, USE BULLETS]
[MORE INFO]
Alik Levin
When I fire up a new email with Ctrl + Shift + M I am immediately reminded that this email may be not necessary at all. But if it is, then I need to write it the way so that it builds a rapport. Once the email complete I delete the guidance part. To set up your email signature in Outlook 2007 follow this procedure:
 |
Click on Tools menu in Outlook 2007
Click on Options…
Click on Mail Format tab
Click on Signatures… button
You should see something similar as depicted in the picture only with your own signature - of course, you may adopt mine 
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You’ve just created email template that guides you to write emails that builds rapport. That should increase your chance to make an impact/influence without authority.
Creating email delivery delay rule
This one helps implementing “Park” method – Emotional Intelligence Core Skills.
- Click on Tools menu.
- Click on Rules and Alerts… option.
- Click on New Rule…
- Under Start from a blank rule choose Check messages after sending option.
- Click Next button.
- Click Next button again.
- Confirm that this rule is to be applied to every message you send by Clicking on the Yes button (you should get this alert after step 6).
- Check defer delivery by a number of minutes.
- Under Step 2:… click on a number of and specify number of minutes you desire your message to wait in the Outbox.
- Click Finish.
Done.
You’ve just implemented “Park” method – Emotional Intelligence Core Skill - using Outlook 2007. Each email will be waiting for 1 minute allowing you to regret and just delete before it hits the wire.
Emotions are unavoidable and can be both friends and enemies as Mike points out in his Emotions Are Your Best Friend and Enemy. Make friends not enemies. John Wooden’s take is that Emotion Is Your Enemy though.
Self Test
- Think impact first. Do you reply to email first then think what potential impact might have or first think if the impact you would like to make and then craft the email?
- Clear ideas - clear writing. Is your email just a rundown or well formed, easy to read, easy to act upon?
- Build rapport. Are your emails emotional or to the point backed with relevant materials?
June 23rd, 2008 — Getting results, Time Management
Got tons of stuff to do? Do not know where to start? Cannot choose one thing one over another? Juggling too many things at once?Another day’s gone and you look back scratching your head asking yourself “what have I accomplished today?”
You need to prioritize to achieve results while keeping sane lifestyle. But how do you prioritize one thing over another?
Adopt Steven Covey’s advice – Urgent/Important quadrants as he outlines it in his First Things First book. It works for me and it should work for you too.
by jayniebell
Steven Covey offers simple technique - Urgent/Important quadrants - to prioritize your activities should your care for achieving results.
Chance Brown shares absolutely coolest mindmap images of the concept.
Below is how it’s represented on Wikipedia:
Important but not Urgent
Focus here. This is the main focus area. Day-to-day work. Directly impacts your personal achievement. This quadrant includes the following areas:
Important and Urgent
Switch quickly. Identify the event as Important and Urgent. quickly switch, enter [SWAT/under fire] mode (custody of J.D. Meier). Hit the goal. Return to “Important but not Urgent” quadrant (usually recreation).
- Emergency.
- Urgent family matters.
- Lifetime opportunity.
- Disaster.
Not Important but Urgent
“Say NO until your tongue bleeds” – adopt this advice from Harvey Mackay. For more cool real world advices read his book - Swim with the Sharks Without Being Eaten Alive: Outsell, Outmanage, Outmotivate, and Outnegotiate Your Competition. The technique seem to produce more enemies than friends, but in the long run it pays off. You are your best friend. Take care for yourself first when you need to balance your time (notice – you are in “Not Important” quadrant!).
Not Important and not Urgent
Careful. Do not mix this one with recreation in the “Important but not Urgent” quadrant. Stay away from this one! Just stay away from it.
- Trivia.
- Busywork.
- Email shuffling.
- Time wasters.
Self test
- Define your life projects. Do you know what you spend your life for? If you do – can you write down it as a simple list?
- Set goals in each. Do you know what you want to achieve? If you are – can you write down it as a simple list?
- Allocate time. Are you aware of how much time you invest in your life time projects? If you are – how much for each project?
More details in Time Management - Do You Control Your Life Or Life Controls You?
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June 20th, 2008 — Getting results, Time Management
You’ve created your life architecture and design. You have a dream to fulfill for each life project. What’s next?
Allocate time (T-i-m-e) and manage it.
by laffy4k
I use Outlook 2007 Calendar to manage my time for each life project. It holds not only work meetings but all my life activities.
After defining the life projects as Outlook 2007 categories I block time in the Calendar proactively. I monitor it through my time control dashboard based on Vista Sidebar. For each time slot I peacefully process relevant pipeline items tagged with similar category. Fast-to-done.
Step-by-step recap
Following are the steps for implementing the time management system.
What life projects can look like?
J.D.Meier’s suggests the following life projects in his Life Frame post:
- Mind
- Body
- Emotions
- Career
- Financial
- Relationships
- Adventure
Matthew Kelly suggest similar list in his The Dream Manager book:
- Physical
- Emotional
- Intellectual
- Spiritual
- Psychological
- Material
- Professional
- Financial
- Creative
- Adventure
- Legacy
- Character
What are yours? How do you manage time for each?
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